


i fall and stumble towards the light

by demonicneonfishy



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Drowning, Family Bonding, Hurt/Comfort, I really have no idea how to tag this, Kinda, M/M, Nightmares, Panic Attacks, basically nicky's in the coffin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-09
Updated: 2020-12-09
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:01:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27979275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/demonicneonfishy/pseuds/demonicneonfishy
Summary: Joe takes a deep breath, his shoulders trembling, and whispering something in a language she doesn’t recognise.“What’s going on?” Andy asks from the doorway.“Nicoló,” Nile says. “He’s free.”-Five hundred years ago, Nicoló was lost to the sea. Or, so they thought, until Nile dreamed of him, still alive.Now, the dreams have changed.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 15
Kudos: 435





	1. 1

**Author's Note:**

> hello everyone! this one was originally written as a prompt fill on tumblr for joe/nicky and the word free - it was only supposed to be three sentences and then this happened. oops

_ He dies at least ten times before he reaches the surface. _

_ He doesn’t know which way is up, but he swims anyway. The coffin had finally rusted enough for him to break through, and he’s been swimming for what feels like forever. _

_ His head breaks the surface, and he coughs up lungfuls of seawater, and then  _ breathes.  _ It feels like the first time ever. He doesn’t know how long it’s been. _

_ He lies back, staring at the sun. He knows he has to try and get to shore, but he revels in the feeling of its light on his face. _

_ After five centuries, Nicoló di Genova is free. _

* * *

Nile gasps awake.

Joe wakes up too, looking around the room to try and find the threat before relaxing when he realise there’s nothing there.

She’d felt him  _ breathe _ . The man, Nicoló, the one trapped under the sea. But that wasn’t possible.

“Same again?” Joe asks.

She’d stopped describing the dreams after the second time. The pain on Joe’s face was too much to bear. But he still asks, every time.

“I felt him breathe,” she says shakily. “I saw the sun... he’s  _ free _ .”

Joe doesn’t say anything. When she looks over, she sees he’s gone pale.

“Are you sure?” he says, struggling to keep his voice steady.

“I don’t know where he is, but I think he’s out.”

Joe takes a deep breath, his shoulders trembling, and whispering something in a language she doesn’t recognise. 

“What’s going on?” Andy asks from the doorway.

“Nicoló,” Nile says. “He’s free.”

Wordlessly, Joe stands, and Andy moves aside to let him leave.

Nile watches him go. “Is he-”

“He’ll be okay.” Through the window, she can see Joe leaning on the rail of the safehouse’s porch. “Once we find Nicoló.”

* * *

It takes a week for him to get to shore. 

Nile sleeps as much as she can, searching the dreams to find any hint of his location. She can feel his desperation to get back to them, to find Joe. In return, she tries to focus on sending him their location, images of Andy with her axe, Quynh teaching Nile how to use a bow, and Joe. Always Joe.

_ Hold on,  _ she tells him,  _ we’re coming to find you _ .

A week after he breathes for the first time, she sees him stumbling onto shore, his legs weak from disuse. She memorises as much of the coastline as she can.

When she describes it to Andy, the other woman’s brow furrows.

“Could be somewhere in England,” Quynh suggests. “It would make sense.”

“Keep looking,” Andy tells Nile. “There’ll be something more obvious soon.”

Andy is right. The next dream shows Nicoló in what looks like a gift shop, in a black shirt with a skull and crossbones on the front, running his fingers over a ‘Penzance’ keychain.

“He’s in Cornwall,” Nile says when she wakes. “Penzance.”

“Then let’s go,” Andy says.

* * *

Joe hasn’t been able to sleep well in five hundred years. He sleeps holding a pillow to his chest, but it’s a poor substitute.

He’d almost given up on ever seeing Nicoló again. 

This past week, he hasn’t slept for a different reason.

_ Five hundred years. Will Nicoló even know him? _

Copley secures them a safehouse in Penzance and does his best to cover up reports of a man who walked out of the sea speaking heavily accented old English.

_ What could five hundred years have done to him? _

Joe writes a note in old Ligurian, knowing that Nicky speaks a version of English five hundred years out of date, and is probably overwhelmed by the world now.

_ Nicoló. We will meet you at this address. Hold on, my love, we’re coming. _

Below that is the address and a rough sketch of the house. Nile stares at it for hours in an attempt to memorise it, and Joe hopes Nicoló will understand.

It takes them too long to reach Penzance. They pull into the safehouse’s driveway, and Joe is opening the door before the car even stops. Nile makes to get out too, but Quynh holds her back. 

He can’t open the door fast enough, his fingers fumbling as he tries to unlock the door, his heart pounding-

He gets it open, and he steps inside-

And Nicoló turns to look at him.

A strangled cry tears itself from Joe’s throat, a noise that’s somewhere between laughing and crying, that sounds more animal than human.  _ Five hundred years _ . 

Five centuries of mourning, of being torn between wanting Nicoló back and hoping his immortality had ended, so that he would be free of his torment.

And now Nicoló is right in front of him.

“Is this real?” Nicoló asks tentatively in Ligurian, his voice weak. “Yusuf?”

“ _ Nicoló _ ,” Joe whispers. 

He isn’t sure which of them starts moving first. All he knows is that one moment he’s staring, unable to move, and the next he’s across the room and holding onto Nicoló like his life depends on it.

They’re both crying, he thinks. He buries his face in Nicoló’s shoulder and breathes in, his tears soaking Nicoló’s shirt. 

“I missed you,” he whispers. It’s not enough to describe the pain of that five hundred years, of missing him every time he tried to fall asleep alone, every time he saw the longsword by the door, every time Booker (and later Nile) woke from their dreams of him drowning.

“I missed you too,” Nicoló whispers back. He clutches at Joe’s shirt like he can’t believe this is real.

Joe pulls back, taking Nicoló’s face in both his hands, gently tracing the lines of the face he knows better than his own.

“How long?” Nicoló asks.

“Five hundred,” Joe whispers. “Too long.”

Nicoló lets out a small sob, and pulls him closer. Joe isn’t planning on letting go any time soon.

“I’m here, my love,” he whispers. “I’m not going to leave you again.”

“You promise?”

“I promise.”


	2. 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He learns how to use the oven in the kitchen. He learns modern English through the books he finds in the house. He sings to himself, talks to himself in every language he can remember, just to remember how to use his voice again.   
> My name is Nicoló di Genova. I died in 1099. I have two sisters, Andromache and Quynh, and I have Yusuf. I have seen civilisations rise and fall.   
> -  
> the events of last chapter, from nicky's point of view!

When the dreams started,  Nicoló felt like crying.

He’d seen the man - Sebastien - first. He’d felt his grief, his anger.

But through his eyes, he got to see his family again. Andromache with her ancient eyes. Quynh with her quick, easy laughter. 

And Yusuf. He’d been so relieved the first time he saw him, smiling and laughing and undoubtedly alive. All this time, he’d feared that Yusuf’s time had come while he’d been trapped beneath the sea.

The dreams had been the only thing keeping him sane. He died and revived, and he dreamed.

Then the girl. Nile, like the river, young and brave and full of life. She’d saved them all. 

Then Sebastien left them. Nicoló doesn’t know the full details of what happened, but he knows his family, knows they wouldn’t have done it without a good reason.

Now, the dreams are the only way he knows anything about this new world.

He stumbles onto the shore and his legs nearly collapse from under him. It’s been so long since he stood on solid ground. They used to joke about getting used to the movement of a ship’s deck beneath their feet, and now Nicoló has to get used to standing at all.

For a few moments, he lies on the sand, exhausted. He has been swimming for what he thinks is a week, by the movements of the sun, but he doesn’t know for sure.

He’d died of dehydration, starvation, exposure, exhaustion, and yet he’d kept swimming.

Now, the stars are above him, so few compared to the skies he’s used to.

_ So much has changed _ .  _ How long was he gone? _

The beach is empty, but he knows to be careful. He lies there for a few more moments before getting up.

He needs to find somewhere to stay. He needs to find food. 

He needs to find Yusuf.

Joe, now. Andromache is Andy. Sebastien is Booker. More changes.

He walks unsteadily up the beach and towards the town. Nobody is awake to see him, but he stays to the shadows anyway.

There is a shop of some kind, filled with brightly colored toys and pictures of beaches. The images are remarkably realistic, almost too real to be a painting.

The type of lock is unfamiliar, but he breaks it open anyway and resolves to return here with money when he finds his feet. Right now, he’s desperate.

He finds what looks like clothing - a black shirt with crossed swords, and a pair of trousers that only just reach his knees, red patterned with strange gold coins. He pulls them on quickly. 

Now, he needs to find somewhere to hide. He knows Yusuf -  _ Joe _ \- will come for him. He just needs to find a way to communicate.

He ends up taking two towels from the shop before leaving, careful to leave no evidence of his presence.

Back on the beach, he finds a secluded area hidden by the cliffs, wraps himself in the towels for warmth, and prepares to wait until morning.

* * *

_ “Inhale,” Quynh says, “exhale, and release.” _

_ Nile lets go of the bowstring. The arrow flies through the air and hits the target, dead center.  _

_ Joe, from the porch, whoops. Nile smiles at him. _

_ “Could be somewhere in England,” Quynh says. “It would make sense.” _

_ “Keep looking,” Andy tells Nile. “There’ll be something more obvious soon.” _

_ Joe stirs something in a pot on the stove, humming quietly to himself. _

_ Quynh sits in front of Andy, letting the other woman braid her hair. _

_ Nile watches them all with a small smile. Family. _

_ Hold on, Nile says, we’re coming to find you. _

Nicoló jolts awake.

* * *

This new world is full of bright colors.

Nicky stands in a different shop, this one full of… pirate things? Pirates must not be around in the way they used to be, if this is what people think when they hear  _ pirate _ .

Nicoló  _ was  _ a pirate, once. A long time ago.

He traces one of the little charms hanging off a rack. Penzance, it says. England. Cornwall, to be precise. 

“Can I help you?” a woman asks him. 

He smiles at her, and hopes he doesn’t seem suspicious. “I am fine, thank you.”

She gives him an odd look and walks away.

His English is out of practice, and he has a heavy accent, and his voice is weak. And his language is however-many-years out of date.

He will have to learn how the world works anew.

He knows he needs to eat, but he doesn’t have the money. But he was four hundred years old when he went under. He has learned how to be hungry, and how to steal food if necessary.

* * *

Nicoló, the note says. 

Yusuf’s handwriting, more familiar than his own. The language is the one he taught Yusuf in the early years of knowing each other, and now is extinct but for them.

We will meet you at this address. Hold on, my love, we’re coming.

A sketch of the house, below that. Familiar - maybe he’s passed it when he wandered the town. 

Nicky wakes with a choked sob.

They’re coming for him. They know where he is.

His family is coming.

Only a little longer.

* * *

He finds the house without too much trouble. There is a key tucked under the doormat. Nicoló lets himself inside.

It’s empty, but it’s warm. It’s inside. There is a kitchen, and a bed. That is all he needs.

In the bathroom, he finds a set of scissors. He gathers his hair up into one long tail, takes the scissors, and begins to cut.

He cuts his hair to his shoulders. It’s enough for now. It had grown long in the coffin. Not as long as it could have, given the conditions, but long all the same. He remembers the feeling of it brushing against his shoulders in the water, and shudders. 

The next few days are spent learning how to be human again.

He learns how to use the oven in the kitchen. He learns modern English through the books he finds in the house. He sings to himself, talks to himself in every language he can remember, just to remember how to use his voice again. 

_ My name is Nicoló di Genova. I died in 1099. I have two sisters, Andromache and Quynh, and I have Yusuf. I have seen civilisations rise and fall.  _

He waits.

One day, he hears one of the strange chariots - cars, he remembers, they’re called cars - drawing closer. He gets to his feet, hoping.

The key turns in the lock, and he’s ready to defend himself if he needs to, but he really hopes he doesn’t have to.

Footsteps. A rhythm he knows the way he knows his own heartbeat.

_ Joe _ . 

He turns.

Joe makes a small, choked sound and Nicoló can’t move. It’s been so  _ long _ , and he’s  _ here _ , and Nicoló has dreamed about this too many times to count.

_ What if it is a dream?  _ He can’t feel the water, but he’s believed that the dreams were real before.

Then he woke, and drowned.

“Is this real?” he asks in Ligurian. He doesn’t know how he’ll bear it if it isn’t. Since Sebastien came, his dreams had been about his family, not escape. “Yusuf?”

“ _ Nicoló _ ,” Joe whispers. God, he’s missed that. How long has it been since he heard his own name?

Then they’re moving towards each other, and then they’re holding on to each other, and Nicoló thinks he’s shaking, and there are tears streaming down his face.

He wants to speak, but there are no words to describe quite how much he’s missed Joe. 

“I missed you,” Joe whispers. 

“I missed you too.” He clings to Joe’s shirt and still doesn’t want to let himself believe this is real.

Joe pulls back, brushing back Nicoló’s hair from where it’s fallen into his eyes.

“How long?” he asks.

“Five hundred. Too long.”

_ Five hundred years. _

_ Five hundred years of drowning, of the coffin under the sea, of not daring to let himself hope for escape. _

_He is nine hundred years old,_ he thinks. _Over half his life, trapped under the sea_.

A sob tears itself from his throat. He holds on tighter.

“I’m here, my love,” Joe says gently. “I’m not going to leave you again.”

Maybe, just maybe, this is real.

“You promise?” 

“I promise.”


	3. 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I do not know how to be the same person I was,” Nicky whispers.   
> “Then don’t. Just be you.”  
> -  
> the end, in which Nicky begins to heal.

Healing will take time.

Joe knows this. Nicoló does too. They cannot expect things to go back to how they were immediately.

Joe doesn’t stray too far, even when Andy, Nile and Quynh enter the room. Nicoló hugs Andy, then Quynh, then turns to Nile.

“It is nice to meet you,” he says slowly. “Nile?”

Nile nods, a smile spreading across her face. “Nicoló?”

Nicoló nods, smiling too. “Thank you for the dreams. Without them, I would have been lost, I think.”

“Don’t mention it.”

Nicoló tilts his head in confusion.

“I mean. Don’t worry about it.”

This phrase, he knows. 

He has missed so much.

“You’ll get there,” Joe says softly in Ligurian, as if reading his mind. “We have time, Nico.”

Nicoló nods. Why does he feel like crying?

“I’m hungry,” Quynh announces. “Did Copley leave food?”

“There is some in the…” He doesn’t know the word. “The silver cabinet. The cold one.”

“Fridge,” Joe says. “Keeps food cold, even in the warmest summers.”

“We’ll cook tonight,” Andy says, exchanging a meaningful look with Joe. 

They don’t talk about the coffin. Not while they wait, not at dinner, not after. Instead, they talk about the world. Nile teaches him new phrases -  _ yeet  _ is new to all of them - and Andy explains the major events that have taken place since he went under.

America is independent now, for one thing. He wonders if he’ll ever catch up.

“Can I call you Nicky?” Nile asks suddenly.

Nicoló thinks. Maybe this is what he needs. A new start.

“Yes,” he says.

(Later, he repeats it to himself, over and over.  _ Nicky, Nicky, Nicky _ until it sounds familiar. His voice is beginning to sound more like his own again, not like a stranger’s. It’s nice.)

(Later, he and Joe retreat to their own room, and Nicoló - Nicky isn’t sure what to do at first, but then Joe wraps his arms around him and holds him close, and they fall into place the way they always have, and Nicky falls asleep, safe and content for the first time in five hundred years.)

* * *

Nicky wakes screaming.

He doesn’t know where he is, only that it’s dark and he’s just woken from something that felt horribly like drowning and he doesn’t know what’s real anymore. He thrashes and writhes in Joe’s arms, screaming loud enough to wake the whole house.

Andy and Quynh burst into the room, Nile close behind them.

Nicky’s screams die down, replaced with deep, desperate breaths as if he’s trying to get as much air into his lungs as possible.

“Nicoló,” Joe says in Ligurian. “Nicoló, you’re safe. You’re not there anymore. You are with us, and we are with you. Breathe, my love, I have you.”

There are tears streaming down Nicky’s face, but he seems to relax, burying his face in Joe’s shoulder with a strangled sob.

Quynh crosses the room to sit beside them on the bed. “May I touch you?” she asks Nicky.

He nods, and she places her hand on his shoulder, moving her thumb in soothing circles.

Andy is next, sitting down on the floor and resting her head on Nicky’s leg. Nile isn’t sure whether to move, but Joe pats the space beside him, and she sits down on the bed too, reaching out to touch Nicky’s arm.

Quynh begins to sing, in a language long since lost to history. The words don’t matter, though - it’s the tune, soothing and gentle, like a lullaby. Andy joins in next, in a different language, with a slightly different tune, but they harmonise so well Nile assumes they must have practiced.

Then Joe, in a different language to both of them, running his fingers through Nicky’s hair as he sings. 

Nile doesn’t know the words, but she hums along with them, and Andy looks up at her with a smile.

Eventually, Nicky’s breathing eases, and his tears subside. 

“I am sorry,” he whispers. “I did not mean to disturb anyone. You may leave, if you wish.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Andy scoffs. “Move over, both of you.” 

Joe and Nicky slide back into the center of the bed. Quynh climbs in the far side, curling close to Joe’s back. Joe holds Nicky tightly, and Andy positions herself between Nicky and the door. Nile lingers nervously on the edge before Andy pulls her down too.

They fall asleep like that, all curled together, and nobody wakes until morning.

* * *

Drinking is the first thing Nicky learns.

He’d avoided water, until then, sticking to things that tasted very strongly of  _ not  _ seawater, and taking very small sips at a time.

Now, they’re trying it.

He’s sitting on the sofa between Joe’s legs, holding a glass of water in one hand. He tilts his head back to rest on Joe’s shoulder.

“Take all the time you need,” Joe says gently, taking Nicky’s free hand and tangling their fingers together. 

He lifts the glass to his lips and drinks.

It’s only one sip, but he’s already choking on it, lurching forward and trying to remember how to make his lungs work.

“Hey, hey, you’re okay,” Joe says. “Breathe.”

He takes a deep breath.

_ You are okay. You are out. You are free. _

“Try taking it slowly,” Joe suggests. “Just a little bit to start. We have time, remember?”

Nicky takes the smallest of sips, and swallows, and doesn’t lose himself completely.

“Okay?” Joe asks. 

“Okay,” he replies.

* * *

Nicky learns not long after that he can’t take the sensation of water against his skin.

Joe, Andy and Quynh had left earlier that morning. Joe hadn’t wanted to leave him, but Nicky convinced him he’d be okay.

He can hear Nile singing to herself in the kitchen. She’d decided that Nicky absolutely _had_ to try a chocolate chip cookie, whatever that is, and wanted to make them herself.

He likes Nile.

Nicky, on the other hand, is standing in front of a sink filled with water and trying to work up the courage to touch it.

The thought of the ocean still makes him feel sick, but he wants to see if fresh water is any different. And maybe it won’t affect him. Maybe he isn’t as broken as he thought.

Tentatively, he reaches out and places his hand in the water.

It’s warm. Not like the sea. He’d made sure of that.

_ Any moment now, you’ll wake up, and you’ll drown, and none of this is real, you’re dreaming- _

Nicky pulls his hand from the water with a strangled cry.

He blinks, and he’s sitting on the floor, his back against the wall, and he isn’t quite sure how he got here, but he can still feel the water against his hand, and this isn’t real, isn’t real, isn’t real-

“Nicky? Everything okay?” 

Nile appears in the doorway, and her eyes widen at the sight of him.

He can’t breathe, can’t get enough air into his lungs, he’s drowning-

“Nicky.” She crouches in front of him. “Breathe. You’re safe. I’m here.”

Breathing. Right. He needs to breathe.

He inhales, and his lungs  _ don’t  _ fill with water. Because he is free. He is free, and he can no longer feel the water.

Nile stays with him while he calms down, and after. Neither of them speak.

He can hear the door opening. Nile squeezes his shoulder and leaves the room.

A few moments later, Joe walks in, looking around frantically.  _ Nile must have told him _ .

He sees Nicky, then sees the water, and sighs. Wordlessly, he pulls the plug and lets the water drain out of the sink, then sits down beside him. 

Almost instinctively, Nicky rests his head on Joe’s shoulder.

He is safe. Yes. 

“I used to dream,” he says quietly. “In the water. Before Sebastien came. It took time for me to wake, I think. Because it had been so long.” 

He takes a shuddering breath.

“I would dream of breaking out. Of finding all of you. They… they felt real. But I would always feel the water, before I woke up.”

Joe is silent for a long time. Then he takes Nicky’s hand. 

“You have nothing to prove,” he says. “You don’t need to hurt yourself trying to heal faster.”

Joe knows. The second he saw the water in the sink he knew what Nicky was trying to do, and it breaks his heart.

“I do not know how to be the same person I was,” Nicky whispers. 

“Then don’t. Just be you.”

* * *

Nicky finds them in the garden. Nile with Quynh’s bow again, taking aim at a tree. It reminds him of a question he’d been meaning to ask for a little while now.

“Do you have my sword?” he asks.

Joe nods and disappears inside the house, returning a few moments later with Nicky’s longsword.

“I kept it in good condition,” he says, offering it to Nicky. “Just in case.”

Nicky takes it with a smile.

He draws it, and  _ oh _ , he’s missed this.

Five hundred years under the ocean have not completely changed him. He knows the weight of the sword in his hand, and he falls back into a familiar rhythm.

_ Step forward. Lunge. Recover. Parry. Counter. _

Joe picks up his scimitar. Nicky smiles.

They’ve fought each other many times over the years, even after they stopped killing each other, for practice and for fun. Joe has the advantage at first, but Nicky falls back on four hundred years of instinct and muscle memory and soon they’re evenly matched. Each knows the other’s movements better than his own, and they move as if they’re dancing rather than fighting.

Out of the corner of his eye, Nicky sees Nile lower her bow and turn to watch, mesmerised.

Eventually, Joe stumbles slightly, and Nicky takes the opening it leaves, circling around Joe’s blade and holding the tip of his sword up to Joe’s throat.

“I win.”

Joe drops his scimitar and raises both hands with a smile. “This time, maybe. Next time, who knows?”

“Me.”

“If you say so,  _ habibi _ .”

Nicky laughs for the first time in five hundred years.

Joe freezes at the sound. One he hadn’t heard in centuries, one he thought he’d never hear again, same as it was almost a millennium ago. 

Joe stares at him, and then begins to laugh too. And it’s not even that funny, but they’re both laughing and crying and Nicky thinks he could fly.

For the first time in five hundred years, he feels like  _ himself  _ again.

Andy and Quynh are smiling. Nile too.

And Nicky doesn’t think about the water.

* * *

There will be bad days. Days when he drifts, and it takes a hand on his back or a whispered word from Joe to bring him back to reality. Nights when he wakes screaming, convinced he is drowning.

There will be good days, too. When he learns about  _ television _ , and  _ wifi _ , and all the new things the 21st century brings. When he teaches Nile to use his longsword and they all cheer when she finally lands a hit. When he and Joe, inevitably, return to Malta, and the sight of the sea doesn’t make him feel sick anymore.

Healing will take time.

But, with his family beside him, he will heal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading!   
> i'm demonicneonfishy on tumblr too!


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